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I am hopefully going to be allowed to take my daughters (9 and 6) on a 10 day summer holiday.
Fair to say they really don't enjoy my hobbies so sailing and bike touring are out. They do enjoy; camping; water parks; dancing; music/cabaret; short traffic free bike rides; other children's company and tablets!
We have a VW T5, which will hopefully be up rated to a motorhome, so I am thinking French campsite with waterpark and clubhouse. We have friends mid Brittany so probably no further than a days drive south from there. Happy to do a couple of stop road trip.
Any recommended sites or alternative suggestions for waterpark campsites.
thanks
Fair to say they really don’t enjoy my hobbies so sailing and bike touring are out.
Would sailing be palatable if it was an instagramable flotilla holiday in the med rather than UK sailing (i.e. dinghy racing round the cans on a gravel pit in February) ? Depends on budget though.
Sounds like a plan with the Van - also, if you don't want to go as far, there are plenty of UK campsites with kids entertainment, but, like with any of these sites, it will be busy and noisy, but that's what the kids love. We did a few short flight trips to hotels with the kids when younger and tolerated the kids entertainment in the evenings.
Does sound like a Eurocamp / Siblu type holiday would fit the bill well for a few days of that trip. Not used them in that area though so no specific recommendations other than look for the ones with more of a water park theme. Some just have more of a straightforward pool + kids pool though might be near beaches to compensate.
we are looking at eurocamp for next year would tick many of your boxes. Significantly cheaper than the uk equivalent, and hopefully better weather
I love Les Landes the coastal strip west of Bordeaux
Huge shallow warm lakes
Traffic free cycling
Great weather
Great campsites in pine forest with sandy soil
I think there is water park
100km long sandy beach with surfing
But it’s a bigish drive
We head to France every summer and use there campsites, we generally stay on smaller sites but plenty to keep kids happy (12-14). Much prefer the mountains to coast . Always book direct, I can highly recommend the couple shown below and also this site below which we use to choose places to go.
https://www.sites-et-paysages.co.uk/
https://www.camping-hautsderosans.com/
https://www.domaine-de-pradines.com/
Somewhere with a lot of kids activities and single mums?
But Eurocamp type places sound spot on.
all inclusive Jet 2 or similar is my default go to with the kids
We had our first ever all inclusive holiday in crete, it was fantastic with our 2 boys. The hotel was right on the beach (with a beach bar) there were activities throughout the day that the kids enjoyed, loads of other kids for them to play with, multiple swimming pools, a decent sized water park at the top of the hill and mini golf, tennis courts and all sorts of other bits and bob. Food was great too.
Would definitely recommend
I would definitely do camping, I used to do camping holidays with my son for 10 days and we still have fond memories of it now
they grow up so quickly so doing it at this age is perfect and as he got older we got electrical hookup and a bigger tent
https://milin-kerhe.com/index.html
Lovely campsite. No pool but gentle stream and decent depth river to swim in behind the weir (very slow moving). Lovely beaches for rock pooling. Big tidal range so you can catch fun stuff. Squid, baby flounder etc. some nice towns and markets.
Lots of kids around when I have been.
Some tips from experiences as a single father with two kids.
Have they been camping before for more than a weekend. If this goes wrong, it tains all the time, is cold then it will be a grim few days. If they don't like sailing, for get it. You'll spend all your time managing them to keep them as little unhappy as possible, then when you get home you'll get your butt kicked by your ex for ignoring the obvious 'thy don't like it'.
Go to Europarks, or pick a package for the first trip away. It's a holiday for you as well, so the less stress the better. I like a lot of high activity trips, but a week by the pool isn't terrible either. Once you've done that, then move onto more challenging to organise hols
I would definitely do camping, I used to do camping holidays with my son for 10 days and we still have fond memories of it now
they grow up so quickly so doing it at this age is perfect and as he got older we got electrical hookup and a bigger tent
Thanks everyone.
Camping / motorhoming it is then. Any advance on water park recommendations? Also forgot the kids like amusement / theme parks. I had heard about camping on the Netherlands with amusement parks - any recommendations?
Would sailing be palatable if it was an instagramable flotilla holiday in the med rather than UK sailing (i.e. dinghy racing round the cans on a gravel pit in February) ? Depends on budget though.
Are 9 and 6 year olds on the gram now?
Not all UK sailing is racing - but at 9 and 6 their ability to get involved and understand what they are doing is limited so I'd save that for the future.
Having been through this my suggestion is do whatever the kids would rather do. If they are happy you will be happy. If you are compromising on this and they don't really enjoy it the holiday will be ruined even if you are doing something you may find fun.
All inclusive sunny with a big pool works really well. Eurocamp lodges in sunny locations where the kids can run around free also works well too.
3 people in a small VW avoiding the possibility of rain sounds like a recipe for misery so try to avoid that and all will be good.
I had heard about camping on the Netherlands with amusement parks – any recommendations?
Not sure I can recommend as we never managed to go (Covid), but we had heard good things about this place and were all very excited about going https://www.duinrell.com/
Tripadvisor still rates it well 🙂
Camping / motorhoming it is then. Any advance on water park recommendations? Also forgot the kids like amusement / theme parks. I had heard about camping on the Netherlands with amusement parks – any recommendations?
Would they like disneyland paris? I've taken my daughter here twice and combined it with a day trip to disneyland. Shge loved it. https://www.eurocamp.co.uk/campsites/france/paris/la-croix-du-vieux-pont-campsite
another vote for Camping Huttopia sites - they are usually excellent for families
Try www.sandaya.co.uk
Poly- I have a yacht - they hate it!
Bent - this looks more like what I think they would like. Anyone been to duinrell? Is the climate any more reliable than UK?
Blackflag been there twice before. The kids liked it but I did not!
ElShalio I proposed at the Noirmoutier Huttopia site !
Larry liking the look of Deux Fontains!
thanks again for your help